1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to mobile communication units, e.g., portable telephone handsets, which are typically of at least the partially opening and/or closing type. More specifically the invention relates to enabling a telephone handset to be at least partially opened, particularly to provide for widening a display area.
2. Brief Description of Related Developments
There is an increasing trend towards smaller portable telephones, as for example to make such phones pocketable; i.e., comfortably fittable within a pocket. One common means in the art of achieving a smaller overall size for such a telephone is to configure the telephone such that it may include a folding or sliding cover for covering up the display and/or control buttons when not in use. Both sliding covers and pivotal clamshell or flip covers are widely used to protect display and/or keypad areas of existing mobile phones against unintended use and against dirt or other contamination from the environment. Such configurations have become popular in many consumer markets.
However, there also remains a general desire for having a large display area, especially for multimedia and/or interactive uses. Larger displays are desirable in many applications, such as with pictorials, graphics, in gaming, or in PDA or smartphone operations. Nonetheless, the goal of providing smaller devices runs contrary to the presentation of larger displays for these other applications. Moreover, display area usage in typical existing foldable and/or slidable mobile phones, is generally restricted, i.e., not available until the openable cover thereof has been opened; indeed, very often most if not all phone uses are typically unavailable with existing openable phones prior to the opening of the covers thereof.